National Poetry Day: Ciúnas/Quiet

Ciúnas, sad person, these are the greatdays when one must speak without whining.The children of the long political sleep forced awake. Like a vine heavy with grapes in peak season,laughing at its own potential riches,I don’t think I shall die againand now know I did not die before.

Walking the public squares together again,everyone clicking our picture,I am there with you even whenthree hundred miles awayon enforced holiday, or home unable to get up for lack of the necessary breath. I am drawn to the recognised facein the crowd, checking itselfin the shop window, stunned to find itself here again.

At the pinnacle of a familiar song sung anew, or the glimpse on a passingTV screen of a pale boy beingwhat I once was, tears,and my eyes relit with old light.Because the permafrost I thought my lotgives way, and the Earth shifts as it must,I am like an old loudspeaker with a new batteryswitched on after years in the garden shed.

Back there, I must not go,as there’s nothing but vacated spiders’ websand the ruins of lamps and lawnmowers.

Kevin Higgins, one of our sharpest and most prolific contributors, has been diagnosed with sarcoidosis, see here.